Should I be worried that my trail shoes have increasingly extreme names? Grit, Fellrasier, Roclite, Terra Claw, Arctic Talon.
It’s a case of horses for courses, or rather shoes for courses. Unlike road shoes, where I have a single brand and model that I run in; I have learned that one shoe fits all does not necessarily apply to trails where the underfoot conditions can vary greatly. I learned to my cost in April when my chosen and only shoe did not cope with a technical downhill involving damp and wet conditions over leaves, rocks and tree roots. A number of slips and falls, and a wrenched ankle later I withdrew from the race.
And therein lies a story. When I caught sight of a new ultra-marathon signing up was a 'no brainer', and so I entered the inaugural Dunoon 50k a good few months ago. Note the zero after the five there and the ‘good few months ago’.
There was weather. There is always weather in Scotland, but this weather was biblical. I was wetter than a wet thing that is very wet for nine hours.
“You don’t need cream, you don’t need this and that. The only way to be beautiful is to accept yourself,”
I knew from the offset that the great Glen Ultra was not going to be a peak performance for me and had, or so I thought, set my expectation accordingly.
The chimp is dusting off his little red trousers ready for the Great Glen Ultra where he will undoubtedly put in an appearance or two, and may well run amok again flinging pine cones at us in the woods on the climb out of Drumnadrochit.
Let’s go for a long run, and let’s go for a long run on what is probably the hottest day of the year so far, and let’s just be a smarty pants and tack on an extra 9 miles before meeting friends for the main event. What a marvellous plan!
The 100 Miles of Istria race gave a good opportunity to put the LED Lenser SEO7R head torch through its paces over a lengthy night and over some serious mountain climbs and technical terrain.
You have trained, you have tapered, you have a race plan, your lost luggage arrives in time, you eat enough food to sink the Titanic, get to the start line, and everything is on track until …..
